Deciding how long a piece of string is will probably be an easier task than deciding what to take with and what to leave behind when it comes to tools and spares. I think we can start with the easy one though, the recovery gear.

Recovery Gear

Our main concern is obviously the fact that we will be travelling alone. Because of this, one of the first things we decided on was to get a winch. Budget played a part in our decision. A 'Warn' winch would've been our first choice, but at almost twice the price, we couldn't justify spending that much on a winch. In the end, we settled on one of the new 6.6hp electric T-Max winches. We went for a bigger one, i.e. 10,000lbs for the simple reason that we will be carrying a bit of weight. Weight and sloppy mud doesn't go well together and it will be very easy to get bogged down to the axles. To get the beast out will need a bit of power. T-Max have a good reputation and a few users here in Australia are of the opinion that the internal gears and motor is of very similar quality as the 'Warn' products. At almost half the price, it seemed the right choice for us.

We also bought a heavy duty winch/recovery pack to go with the other recovery gear we had for the smaller HiLux. The ARB compressor will be used to ensure we run with the correct tyre pressures for the terrain we're on. We also decided to get a Hi-Lift jack to go with the exhaust jack we already had. The Hi-Lift was not part of the original recovery list. I'm not that keen on them because they are so dangerous, but again, because we will be travelling alone, we thought it wis probably not such a bad idea to take one with us. You know what it will be like, if we don't have it, we will need it. Even though the exhaust jack is a heavy duty bag, it can still get a hole in, and if this is the only lifting equipment you have and its got a hole in....well, then you might have a bit of a problem.

You obviously can't leave without other sensible bits like a shovel, axe and hacksaw to make revocery a bit easier. Lets just hope that we'll never need to use it, or rather never need to use it in anger.

Tools and spares

I think our toolkit is fairly comprehensive and we have all the essential bits to be able to fix something on the side of the road (whether I will have enough mechanical knowledge or experience to fix something is a different matter all together). I decided to spend a bit of money on a good quality toolset which should last me at for at least 10 years or so, providing I don't loose it.

The approach I tried to take with the spares was one of taking replacement parts for things that would stop us in our tracks, i.e. without it, you ain't going nowhere. My spare parts list is by no means perfect and I'm sure there are a lot of other or better parts to take with, but you have to draw a line somewhere, and with space at a premium, it will have to end here. I'm hoping our list will help you decide what to take with if you can't make up your mind on where to draw the line.